Atmospheric cooling towers are in wide use in industry. These towers receive a relatively warm or hot fluid, and pass the fluid through the tower apparatus so that heat is extracted from the fluid by interaction with relatively cooler ambient air. In some instances, the fluid entering the tower is a process fluid that has been heated by an industrial operation. Also, in some instances, intermediate fluid loops with heat exchangers are used in between the originally hot process fluid and the other fluid actually circulated through the tower.
Industrial cooling towers come in a wide variety of types including, by way of example only, splash bar type wet cooling towers, fill pack type wet cooling towers, dry cooling towers, hybrid wet/dry cooling towers, and dry air cooled condensers. The cooling towers often are designed such that they require a supply of electrical energy or other work energy to drive mechanical systems such as fans and/or pumps which may be present.
Additionally, waste heat expansion engines are known for generating power from exit fluid from power plants, and can require a cooling system such as a cooling tower for condensing the working fluid used in the heat engine. Such expansion engines are also interchangeably referred to herein as waste heat expansion engines or waste heat engines. It is also known to use heat from solar ponds to drive expansion engines and to use cooling towers to cool the expansion engine working fluid in that context.
It would be desirable to reduce the energy consumption of cooling towers, and hence improve the energy efficiency of the towers.